Thoughts on Proposition 8

Hello Family,

This is my first attempt at leaving a post. I hope it goes well...

I remember that the church was involved with five issues. The first was “liquor by the drink”, the state law that prevented hard liquor from being served in bars and restaurants. The second was gambling and lotteries. The third was pornography. The fourth was the dumping of nuclear waste in Utah. The fifth was the equal rights amendment. In all of these instances the church was very open and active. In the first four of these issues the position of the church was preached from the pulpit. Since the church was so small outside of Utah these all were state related issues and there was no big push for this outside of the west.

In the fifth issue, ERA, a letter was read from the pulpit but actual political actions – flyers, rallies, lobbying – were conducted by church members operating under a non church legal entity such as (to make up a name) Missouri mothers against ERA. There might have been token Non Mormons in these groups, but for all intents and purposes it was a Mormon Political Action Group. Church leaders would privately solicit church members for funds to support the activities of these Political Action Groups. These actions were, for the first time, pushed at Mormon congregations across the country.

The first four issues didn’t raise much of a stir. Occasionally a church member might privately disagree with the church stand, but it was far and away the exception. The fourth issue was a huge deal and many Mormon women, and some Mormon men, were opposed to the church stance and said so quite publicly. The crowning moment in that opposition was the excommunication of a woman who publicly called the church leaders “misogynists”. I think the definition of that term is “woman haters”. I personally knew several people who left the church over this issue.

The ERA amendment finally ran out of steam when people realized that the rights hoped for were already incorporated into law and no new amendment was necessary. But public behavior changed because of the publicity and women became involved in business, sports, professions, and the military in ways that had not occurred up to that time. While the church won the battle and was legally correct in their opposition to the ERA amendment, the social behavior that the church opposed, bringing women into equal roles with men, has occurred. The church won the battle but lost the war as the majority of women today, both inside and outside the church, work outside the home and choose to raise fewer and fewer numbers of children.

So much for history. On to the issue at hand.

If marriage is recognized between any two people, not just a male and a female, what new legal rights do these genderless couples obtain?

1. The right to be jointly recognized as parents and to jointly adopt children.
2. The right to be jointly recognized as foster parents.
3. Visitation rights in the event of divorce.
4. Status of next of kin for health care decisions.
5. Joint insurance policies (for auto, home, and health).
6. Divorce protections such as community property and child support.
7. Green cards for non citizen partners.
8. Automatic inheritance in the absence of a will.
9. Joint leases with automatic renewal if one partner leaves or dies.
10. Inheritance of jointly-owned real and personal property through the right of survivorship (which avoids the time, expense, and taxes of probate).
11. Shared benefits such as pensions, annuities, and social security.
12. Spousal exemptions to property tax increases upon the death of one partner who is a co-owner of a home.
13. Veterans’ discounts on medical care, education, and home loans; joint filings of tax returns
14. Wrongful death benefits for a surviving partner and children.
15. Bereavement or sick leave to care for a surviving spouse or child.
16. Crime Victims benefits.
17. Domestic Protection Orders.

This is not a comprehensive list. It comes from a web site that is in support of gay marriage. The gay community asserts that there are 1,400 such rights delineated in federal law. I am no legal scholar but I am guessing these are the most significant rights.

Because of my professional background, I usually first look at issues like this from an economic perspective. As such, domestic laws typically are about resource allocation. I think the main economic impact of gay marriage is to shift resources away from traditional family units into gay family units. This is significant with respect to social security and health care. The insurance companies are especially opposed to gay marriage because it would require them to provide health care benefits to partners. That is no small cost and when the incidence of HIV/ Aids is factored in the liability of insurance companies is enormous. I think it is fair to say that health care insurance premiums would probably increase more than otherwise if the marriage amendment is not passed.

Laws such as the law on gay marriage typically will not pass unless the majority has some personal involvement with the issues. For example, civil rights in this country became a big deal only when whites started to care about it. The black community, in and of itself, could never have gotten the laws passed that provided civil rights regardless of race, color, or creed. The same thing is happening with gay marriage. The gay community, by itself, could never get these laws passed. It is only when the broader community has supported the issue that it has gained momentum.

So how has the broader community gotten involved with this issue? One factor is the fact that more and more people are living together without getting married. These couples are impacted by laws about marriage and would like to have the rights of marriage themselves. This is particularly an issue in Europe, where people don’t marry that often (think of our Danish cousins at Lake Powell). It is more and more an issue in the U.S. on the East and West Coasts. But a second factor is the increased openness and the rising number of gays. No one wants to discriminate against a friend. It is one thing to say no rights to gays when you don’t know any. It is entirely another thing to say no rights for gays when the person you work with is gay. A third factor has to be the change in the portrayal of gays in the media. TV shows and movies have been very supportive of the gay movement and it is now politically incorrect to have any reason not to support the gay agenda.

So like the ERA amendment, there is a rising tide of support for gay related issues. That will not change whether or not Proposition 8 passes. The ERA amendment eventually died. The changes envisioned by that law are now mainstream. My guess is that the acceptance of gay marriage is inevitable. There is too much support for it in the non gay world.
The church has taken a stand on this issue. This stand is not based on any of the points that I have outlined above. The stand is scriptural. The Lord has said that marriage is to be between a man and a woman and that statement has been made numerous times by numerous prophets. It is not a stand that can be supported by secular logic or empirical data. Whatever statements are made about gays being bad parents, or setting a bad sexual example, can be easily countered with numerous examples of bad “traditional” marriages and bad sexual behaviors by married men and women. As a consequence being against gay marriage is a stand that will not be popular and will cause those who support it to be regarded by some as hateful curmudgeons who have lived beyond their time. Those who argue the scriptural view will be seen as Don Quixote like figures, tilting at windmills as the winds of social change blow them away.

We all want to be popular, to be seen as reasonable and kind. To give as a reason “The Lord says so” does not engender popularity or cause one to be seen as reasonable. So it is a hard stand to take. But it is the crux of a believer’s life. When all is said and done the decision to be a follower of Christ is about faith, not just in divinity, but in the community of believers and the leadership of that community.

For me personally, I do not oppose gay marriage because I expect t to win the war in this temporal world. I suspect that whatever happens in California will not stop the increase in visibility of the gay community. But I cannot be a believer and say that I don’t believe what God or His prophets say. I cannot lay claim to the gifts of the Spirit while disavowing the discipline and worship that is the source of that spirit. I am an independent man; I am free to choose what side of this issue I will be on. But the Lord has clearly defined what side He is on, for whatever reason. For me it is no more complicated than that. Wherever God is that is where I want to be. It is quite clear where He is on this issue.